Typhoon Conson kills 18 in the Philippines; record SSTs continue in the Atlantic

Tropical Storm Conson hit the Philippines' main island of Luzon yesterday as a strong tropical storm with 70 mph winds. Conson was briefly the season's first typhoon on Monday, when it intensified to an 80 mph Category 1 storm. Conson is being blamed for at least 18 deaths in the Philippines, with 57 other people missing. The storm caused an extended power outage to the entire island of Luzon. Conson is headed towards a second landfall later this week in China, but should not intensify into a typhoon again because of the presence of 20 - 30 knots of wind shear. Conson is only the second named storm in what has been an unusually quiet Northwest Pacific typhoon season. According to Digital Typhoon, an average season has six named storms by mid-July.

Figure 1. Tropical Storm Conson as captured by the MODIS instrument on NASA's Aqua satellite at 4:55 UTC July 13, 2010. At the time, Conson was a tropical storm with sustained winds of 70 mph. Image credit: NASA.

June SSTs in the tropical Atlantic set a new recordSea Surface Temperatures (SSTs) in the Atlantic's Main Development Region for hurricanes had their warmest June on record, according to an analysis I did of historical SST data from the UK Hadley Center. SST data goes back to 1850, though there is much missing data before 1910 and during WWI and WWII. SSTs in the Main Development Region (10°N to 20°N and 20°W to 80°W) were 1.33°C above average during June, beating the previous record of 1.26°C set in June 2005. June 2010 is the fifth straight record warm month in the tropical Atlantic, and the third warmest anomaly measured for any month in history. The only warmer anomalies were 1.51°C and 1.46°C, set in May 2010 and April 2010, respectively. As I explained in detail in a post on record February SSTs in the Atlantic, the Arctic Oscillation (AO) and its close cousin, the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), are largely to blame for the record SSTs, though global warming and Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) also play a role. The magnitude of the anomaly has fallen over the past month, since trade winds over the tropical Atlantic have increased to slightly above-normal speeds. These higher trade wind speeds are due to the fact that the Bermuda-Azores High has had above-normal surface pressures over the past month. The Bermuda-Azores High and its associated trade winds are forecast to remain at above-average strength during the next two weeks, according to the latest runs of the GFS model. This means that Atlantic SST anomalies will continue to fall during the remainder of July. However, keep in mind that we are talking about anomalies--the ocean will continue to warm until its usual early September peak in temperature, and it is likely that we will have the warmest or second warmest SSTs on record over the tropical Atlantic during the peak part of hurricane season, mid-August through mid-October.

Figure 2. The departure of sea surface temperature (SST) from average for July 12, 2010. Image credit: NOAA/NESDIS.

The tropics are quietThere are no threat areas to discuss in the tropical Atlantic today, and none of the reliable computer models is calling for tropical cyclone development over the next seven days. The NOGAPS model is calling for a strong tropical disturbance to form off the Nicaragua coast this weekend. If this disturbance forms, it would move west-northwest and bring heavy rains to Nicaragua and Honduras early next week.

Excellent! Blast those wish-casters out of the water! I consider myself a sar-caster..As far as cyclones go, it's not gonna' happen, but I'd be thrilled if we got zero more cyclones for the rest of the year.

The issue is that you can't exclude 2005 because it is one of the best analog years. The conditions this year are better than all of the other years from 1990 - 2009 apart from 1995 and 2005 .. and maybe 2008 too.

... and to add to that.

Hurricane seasons are like human beings. No two hurricane seasons are the same. Even with the identical conditions in 2 seasons, the storms will not form on the same days and last the same length. So therefore what matters is the overall activity at the end of the year not how early it starts compared to the other season.

Where this year can really catch up with 2005 is during the period from July 26th to August 21st 2005 when only 2 storms formed ending with 9 storms by August 21st, 2005.

During this phase this year we could see a real increase in activity that could bring us close to 2005 by late August thus putting us on course for the predicted numbers for the year.

We still have the last HALF of July, August, September, October and November. We have 135+ days remaining in the season and people can't seem to grasp the fact that 20 named storms is attainable. Do I believe we'll see 20? No, I think 18 is more reasonable and I've thought that since the beginning. However, I see no reason why it won't happen. Just because models aren't predicting anything for the next 7 days doesn't mean that's how things will play out. In active seasons, random systems spin up quickly out of seemingly nothing and catch us off guard. The problem we have is people have been brainwashed into thinking this season will be similar to 2005 and now they are comparing it to 2005. To be technical, we've had 2 tropical cyclones already and another that was very close to being named (95L). Patience is a virtue and I will be tickled to hell if we have anything less than 15 named storms this season...

Why stop in November? December has been in play throughout the last 15 years.

Quoting Ivanhater:I don't get the people who are saying it will be hard to get close to 20 named storms...its been shown its happened multiple times in the past STARTING in August...

also, look at the factors out there and they ALL point to a VERY active season...I'm quite confident in a 18+ season

We still have the last HALF of July, August, September, October and November. We have 135+ days remaining in the season and people can't seem to grasp the fact that 20 named storms is attainable. Do I believe we'll see 20? No, I think 18 is more reasonable and I've thought that since the beginning. However, I see no reason why it won't happen. Just because models aren't predicting anything for the next 7 days doesn't mean that's how things will play out. In active seasons, random systems spin up quickly out of seemingly nothing and catch us off guard. The problem we have is people have been brainwashed into thinking this season will be similar to 2005 and now they are comparing it to 2005. To be technical, we've had 2 tropical cyclones already and another that was very close to being named (95L). Patience is a virtue and I will be tickled to hell if we have anything less than 15 named storms this season...

THREAT FOR STRONG TORNADOES AND DAMAGING WIND APPEAR TO BE INCREASING THIS AFTERNOON INTO THE EARLY EVENING FROM SERN MN INTO W-CNTRL THROUGH SWRN WI AND EXTREME NERN IA.

A PDS TORNADO WATCH WILL LIKELY BE ISSUED SOON FOR PARTS OF SERN MN INTO CNTRL AND SRN WI.

STORMS HAVE INTENSIFIED IN VICINITY OF AN E-W ORIENTED OUTFLOW BOUNDARY AND WITHIN ZONE OF PRE-FRONTAL LOW LEVEL CONFLUENCE FROM W-CNTRL WI SSWWD INTO SERN MN. THE SHEAR-PARAMETER SPACE WITHIN THIS REGION HAS BECOME VERY FAVORABLE FOR SUPERCELLS CAPABLE OF STRONG TORNADOES. LATEST OBJECTIVE ANALYSIS SHOWS 0-1 KM STORM RELATIVE HELICITY FROM 300-400 M2/S2 ALONG WITH 2000-3000 J/KG. SUPERCELLS WITH STRONG TORNADOES AND BOWING SEGMENTS WITH DAMAGING WIND WILL BE POSSIBLE AS STORMS CONTINUE TO DEVELOP THIS AFTERNOON AND EVENING.

1940 LAKEVILLE DAKOTA MN 4468 9324 TORNADO REPORTED BY LAW ENFORCEMENT IN SOUTHERN LAKEVILLE. ANOTHER REPORT OF A TORNADO FROM 2 MILES S OF LAKEVILLE AT INTERSECTION OF INTERSTATE 35 AND HWY 19. VEHICLE (MPX)

I always hated living in the Dallas in the summer. Wake up to 80+, get up to over 100 with moderate to high humidity. At least in Houston we usually get into the 70s overnight. And only upper 90s with mod to high humidity.

Dallas-Ft Worth, TX the heat is tolerable! We have our dew points drop into the 55F-68F range during the 100+F days.

Houston, TX heat is MISERABLE, with dew points always in the 72-77F range in July & August.

I think their numbers are too high if July blanks at zero. Exclude 2005, in the last 20 years the top number of forming storms in August through the end of the season is 15. Add 15 to 1 equals 16.

As far as the UKMET at 27 and NOAA at 23...nope...ain't happening.

The issue is that you can't exclude 2005 because it is one of the best analog years. The conditions this year are better than all of the other years from 1990 - 2009 apart from 1995 and 2005 .. and maybe 2008 too.

Quoting Bordonaro:Probably not, a cold front is expected to move through their region later tonight.

We are used to high heat indices in TX, like Btwn08 & I, but MN!

I always hated living in the Dallas in the summer. Wake up to 80+, get up to over 100 with moderate to high humidity. At least in Houston we usually get into the 70s overnight. And only upper 90s with mod to high humidity.

Quoting lilElla:Thanks Angiest & Bordo. This evening could be very interesting. Spotters in this area are already 'on call'. If the storms are anything like the ones in N MN last night, all most all of them were rotating and HUGE hail.